St. Helena Hospital, St. Helena, California
Fuel Cell for Combined Heat & Power

Project Description

St. Helena Hospital is a 181-bed full-service community hospital and part of Adventist Health, a not-for-profit health care system operating in California, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington.

Worldwide, only a small number of buildings are now utilizing fuel cells to create clean reliable heat and power, but this will mark a first for healthcare in on the West Coast. The United Technologies Corporation (UTC) power fuel cell will provide St. Helena Hospital with 400 kilowatts of continuous, clean power. The fuel cell for St. Helena was partially funded by a grant from the California Self Generation Incentive Program (SGIP). This program provides financial incentives for the installation of new, clean, and energy-efficient on-site distributed generation.

Based on Salas O’Brien’s technical expertise, experience with hospitals as well as cogeneration/distributed generation, UTC approached the firm to provide permit and construction design for the new system, and to streamline process and approvals required by the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development (OSHPD) and the interconnected utility (PG&E). Salas O’Brien, in collaboration with UTC, worked closely with the Director of Facilities at St. Helena Hospital to design and engineer a system that would fit into the Hospitals long-term sustainability plan while meeting current and future needs.

UTC’s fuel cell will interface directly with the hospital’s existing infrastructure. This project is a superb example of a successful alternative energy technology that is suited to the hospital’s mission critical environment because of their need for reliable power and thermal energy around-the clock. In addition, this will help the hospital attain their sustainability goals, as they will achieve significant year-round energy savings.

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